Saturday, 26 May 2012

Nebulae Photo Gallery

Helix Nebula

Photograph courtesy NASA/ESA/C. R. O'Dell (Vanderbilt University)

The
familiar eyeball shape of the Helix Nebula shows only two dimensions of
this complex celestial body. But new observations suggest it may
actually be composed of two gaseous disks nearly perpendicular to each
other.

Henize 206 Nebula

Photograph courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech

This
false-color infrared image captured by the Spitzer Space Telescope
shows the Henize 206 Nebula, a massive cloud of gas and dust in which
hundreds and possibly thousands of new stars have formed over the last
ten million years. The nebula, located just outside the Milky Way in a
galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud, offers astrophysicists a
celestial ringside seat on the death and rebirth of stars.

Eskimo Nebula

Photograph courtesy NASA/Andrew Fruchter (STScI)

The
Eskimo Nebula got its name because the astronomer who discovered it in
1787 thought it looked like a person's head surrounded by a parka hood.
This highly detailed image taken in 2000 by the Hubble Space Telescope,
however, reveals a much more complex structure, one which
astrophysicists are still trying to explain.

Rosette Nebula

Photograph courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona

An
infrared image of the Rosette Nebula shows super-hot O stars (blue dots
inside spheres) amid a torrent of gas and dust (green and red). This
star-forming nebula, which lies 5,000 light-years away in the
constellation Monoceros, is named for its rosebud-like shape when seen
using only optical light.

Orion Nebula

Photograph courtesy NASA/C. R. O'Dell (Rice University)

This
true-color mosaic captured by the Hubble Space Telescope shows a small
portion of the Orion Nebula. The image provides unprecedented detail of
the nebula, revealing elongated objects oriented on the region's
brightest stars, rapidly expanding plumes of material around young
stars, and protoplanetary disks.

Eagle Nebula Gas Pillars

This
dark column of cool molecular hydrogen gas and dust is part of the
Eagle Nebula, a star-forming region 6,500 light-years away in the
constellation Serpens. In this image, taken by the Hubble Space
Telescope, new stars can been seen inside fingerlike protrusions
extending from the top of the nebula. Each "fingertip" is slightly
larger than our entire solar system.

Cat's Eye Nebula

The
Cat's Eye Nebula contains some of the most complex gas formations
astronomers have ever seen, including concentric shells, high-speed
jets, and unusual shock-induced knots. Some scientists think the
nebula's intricate structures suggest it is a double-star system.